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Left and Islam

Jen, you questioned my assumption that the left (including the women’s and LGBT movements) are defensive towards Islam. some of the links below support my argument. As far as I can see, any hint at defining people as “other” automatically brings up the defences. Do you really not agree?

The atrocities committed by terrorist organisations cannot be ignored but nor can they be conflated or confused with the Muslim faith.

‘By suggesting that we should ‘fight Islam’ Kelvin Mackenzie yet again spreads the false idea that religion and LGBT equality are not compatible. At Stonewall, we work with many people of faith and faith leaders – including many Muslims – who are LGBT or who believe in and support LGBT equality.

Throughout his career, Daniel Pipes has exhibited a troubling bigotry toward Muslims and Islam. As early as 1983, even an otherwise positive Washington Post book review noted that Pipes displays “a disturbing hostility to contemporary Muslims…he professes respect for Muslims but is frequently contemptuous of them.” Pipes, said the reviewer, “is swayed by the writings of anti-Muslim writers…[the book] is marred by exaggerations, inconsistencies, and evidence of hostility to the subject.” (The Washington Post, 12/11/83)

Muslim religious leaders have joined Christian and Jewish leaders in issuing a joint pleas for tolerance for LGBT people. They have issued a joint letter that states “We affirm our resolute support for Dr Williams’ (leader of the Anglican Church) endeavour and we rededicate our efforts to fighting…homophobia, and to defending the values of tolerance, inclusiveness and respect for differences we all cherish”

Imaan promotes the Islamic values of peace, social justice and tolerance through its work, and aspires to bring about a world that is free from prejudice and discrimination against all Muslims and LGBTQ people.

It means understanding, respecting and celebrating the diversity of our communities, and within organisations it means fair representation and safe spaces for everyone. From this we can examine the oppression and discrimination a person faces, and look at the intersection of oppression, for example, how racism and Transphobia and Islamophobia interact for a Muslim trans person from Bangladesh. Intersectionality encourages solidarity and working together across communities, strengthening our fight against oppression.”

And now? I co-organise the Brum Bi Group, Birmingham’s Bi Group. In the past four years, I’ve gone from being a tentatively openly bi person, to wearing a bi coloured flag band around my arm at work. I work in an inner city primary school with a 97.9% Muslim majority. I am openly bisexual at work to both staff and pupils.

Since publishing Islamic Values and the Parenting Puzzle with Family Action Slough, the Nurturing Programme is being adopted in increasing numbers by Muslims who appreciate how the Nurturing Programme complements Islamic religious values. The booklet uses extracts from the Quran and some sayings (hadiths) of the Prophet Mohammad to demonstrate how Islamic religious values complement the Nurturing Programme

t is thus that Judith Butler, professor of comparative literature at University of California, Berkeley and a “gender and third-wave feminist queer theorist,” justifies her support for Islamist terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah, which she referred to at a 2006 anti-Israel teach-in as “social movements that are progressive… part of a global Left.”

Phyllis Chesler, professor emerita of psychology and women’s studies at the College of Staten Island (CUNY), put it this way: “Western feminists have become totally Stalinized and Palestinianized.” The author of 14 books — most recently An American Bride in Kabul: A Memoir (2013), about her 1961 marriage to an Afghani and her time spent in his harem — Chesler strongly counters the message that leftist feminists are conveying to persecuted Muslim women: that the road to their salvation lies in the defeat of Western civilization, rather than in the overthrow of Sharia-dominated cultures and regimes that degrade and dehumanize them.

Across the Atlantic in the United Kingdom, outspoken hijabi Remona Aly wrote an op-ed in The Guardianin which she praised Muslim outreach to saddened Mancunians, but failed to mention the radical Islamist worldview that says young girls attending a pop concert with a singer dressed in seductive clothes are prostitutes and deserve to die.

…a concise definition of Islamic feminism gleaned from the writings and work of Muslim protagonists as a feminist discourse and practice that derives its understanding and mandate from the Qur’an, seeking rights and justice within the framework of gender equality for women and men in the totality of their existence. Islamic feminism explicates the idea of gender equality as part and parcel of the Quranic notion of equality of all insan (human beings) and calls for the implementation of gender equality in the state, civil institutions, and everyday life. It rejects the notion of a public/private dichotomy (by the way, absent in early Islamic jurisprudence, or fiqh) conceptualising a holistic umma in which Quranic ideals are operative in all space.

Scores of non-Muslims have donned hijabs to express solidarity with Muslim women, too, though some criticized the move, arguing that the garment represents oppression of women.

Young Muslims like Sameeha disagree.

“I do believe hijab support feminism,” she said outside the Muslim prayer center at her school’s College Park campus. “The way you look at it from a religious perspective, it empowers you by strengthening your relationship with God. It’s a step you are taking to further yourself within your own religion.”